Introduction Numerous measures to reduce anthropogenic emissions of green house gases, especially CO2, already exist; however they are still insufficient. It is in this context that the national French project Vitesse2 emerged to develop a method for converting CO2 produced by industries such as steel factory, cement work. The aim of this project is to transform CO2 into methanol, by reduction with hydrogen produced by water electrolysis using electricity provided by decarbonised energies such as nuclear and renewable energies. Beyond the valorisation of CO2, this process not only allows to store carbon-free electricity produced at a relatively low cost as a chemical intermediate (CH3OH is easily recoverable), but also to secure a management function of the electrical grid. In fact, the production of hydrogen is connected to the available quantity of electricity in the network. The main objectives of our work are the synthesis and the characterization of efficient catalysts for CO2 hydrogenation into methanol and the development of reaction conditions leading to improved methanol productivity. Experimental The characterization of catalysts was performed by XRD, BET, H2-TPR, N2O-TPD, TEM, SEM, and TGA. The hydrogenation of CO2 was carried out at 35 mL.min-1 of H2/CO2 (3.9:1) and 5 mL.min-1 of N2 at different temperatures between 220 and 320 °C under 50 bars and a GHSV of 10000 h-1. Results and discussion Our presentation will be focused on the influence of the synthesis method of a CuO-ZnO-ZrO2 catalyst by comparing a classical coprecipitation, a coprecipitation at constant pH and a continuous coprecipitation. The physico-chemical properties of catalysts generated in each synthesis as well as the effect of these modifications on the catalytic behaviour will also be discussed. Conclusion As expected, by modifying synthesis, the methanol productivity is increased with an optimum at 280°C with 787 gMeOH.kgcata-1.h-1 for the CuO-ZnO-ZrO2 catalyst prepared by continuous coprecipitation. Acknowledgement. The authors acknowledge the ANR for the financial support (project Vitesse2).

Catalysts for the CO2 recycling into methanol

249th National Meeting (2015)

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